A Question of Loyalty
by waiting4morning
Summary: Miranda's loyalty to the Illusive Man is unyielding... right? Miranda starts to have conflicting thoughts after Shepard rescues her sister. Features fem!Shep; background pairings f!Shep/Thane and Jacob/Miranda.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: This story takes place before getting Tali, Samara, or Kasumi, but after Miranda's loyalty mission.  
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Miranda stared at her latest report to the Illusive Man on Shepard's activities and chewed on her lower lip. When did these become so hard? When she first boarded the _Normandy_, she had hundreds of little details to report: how Shepard's physical condition was improving (slowly but steadily), how she reacted to the Cerberus logo on the bulkheads (negatively), and even how often she ate (not often enough in Miranda's estimation). Now, however, she felt this odd… block. It wasn't that there was nothing to report. On the contrary, she'd noticed a few things progressing in unforeseen ways—ways that the Illusive Man would want to know about as it would provide yet another leash on Shepard.

Miranda leaned back in her chair, rolling her neck. What was wrong with her?

"Enough," she muttered, and set her fingers to the keys. _Shepard's habit of speaking with the crew after missions continues. Usually, she starts with Joker in the CIC and works her way down deck by deck. Conversation topics range from the banal (Jeff Moreau) to the philosophical (Thane Krios). It is worth mentioning here that Shepard spends, on average, fifteen minutes more in conversation with Krios than any of the other crew, including former teammates Vakarian, Moreau, and Chakwas. _

Miranda stared at the sentences, that uncomfortable feeling coming back again. Quickly, she erased what she had written and drummed her fingers against the desk. This was a problem.

Her door chimed and hissed open. The origin of her troubles stumped through the door, her combat boots heavy against the deck. Shepard slouched in the chair opposite Miranda's desk, grinning toothily.

"Well?"

"Well, what?" Miranda returned, pushing down the tingle of irritation.

"Jacob." Shepard leaned back in her chair, her smile a little too knowing for Miranda's tastes.

Miranda felt an unfamiliar heat warm her face and cleared her throat, keeping her face neutral. "What about Jacob, Commander?"

Shepard rolled her eyes. "Miranda, if you tell me one more time that Jacob was just 'fixing' your submachine gun, I'll boot you out the nearest airlock. I've cleaned and repaired firearms since I was a teenager. One person is all it takes." She smirked. "There's absolutely no reason for his hands to be—"

"Okay!" Miranda said a little too loudly. "Jacob was merely showing me how to properly clean the magazine slide. I'm not as familiar with the M-9 Tempest series as I should be—"

Shepard snorted.

"That's all," Miranda said firmly.

Shepard eyed her for a moment, getting that contemplative look on her face that usually meant the onset of the infamous Shepard Charm. "We're docking at Illium in about a half hour," she said conversationally. "You and I are going to have a drink."

Miranda relaxed at the change in topic. "What is our mission objective?"

"To unwind." Shepard grinned at the look on her face. "Miranda, I have to take this boat to hell in a hand basket. I know it and so does everyone else on the ship. But I'll be damned if I'm going to spend the whole mission full of angst. You can't live like that."

"I'm sorry, Commander, but I have a lot to do..."

"Come on, Miranda," Shepard said in a wheedling tone, "You're the only woman on this ship who isn't intimidated by 'Zombie Shepard' or who wants to get into my pants."

Miranda looked down to hide an unexpected grin. Kelly Chambers did have her uses, but she was a little too friendly at times.

"Do I have to make it an order, _Operative_ Lawson?" Shepard raised an eyebrow and Miranda sighed in defeat.

"Very well, Shepard." After what the Commander had done for Oriana, she supposed she owed Shepard that much.

Miranda eyed the open area of the Eternity bar in Nos Astra with a twinge of impatience. Why they would come back to this dinky little bar when there were plenty of other, more upscale places to choose from was beyond her. Shepard, however, had taken a liking to the asari bartender and Miranda knew that the galaxy's first human Spectre was nothing if not a creature of habit. Even now she was laughing at something the matriarch said as she picked up their drinks.

"I need to introduce her to Wrex sometime," Shepard said with a chuckle as she approached the table that Miranda had picked out. "They'd have a good time together."

"She'd lob a singularity on his scaly ass the minute he tried anything."

Shepard laughed. "Of course she would! That's why Wrex would like her. Foreplay and all that." She waggled her eyebrows suggestively.

Miranda struggled with the idea of the hulking, scarred krogan on Tuchanka wooing the no-nonsense asari matriarch and gave up. Her practical mind rebelled at the idea.

"But they wouldn't have any children," Miranda argued. "Not krogan, anyway, and that's primarily what your friend Wrex seemed most concerned about."

Shepard twisted her drink between her hands, her expression distant. "Just because a couple can't have children together, doesn't mean they would love each other less." Her eyes seemed very intent on the blue liquid swirling around in the glass.

Miranda opened her mouth to mention something logical like the instinctive desire to procreate and then stopped. Thane. Of course.

"Is playing the galaxy matchmaker your secondary mission?" Miranda asked dryly, sipping daintily from her drink.

Shepard grinned. "You know it. I tried to nudge Garrus into Kelly's waiting arms, but he doesn't seem all that interested in her. Guess we need to hike over to Palaven and find a nice turian girl to hook him up with. You already have Jacob of course." Shepard laughed at the look on Miranda's face. "Oh come on. Even _you_ have to admit that any kids you'd have would be the most gorgeous children out there. Your bone structure and his eyes? The galaxy won't know what hit them."

"Shepard, why are you doing this?" Miranda set her drink down a little harder than she intended. "The Collectors aren't waiting around for you to thwart their plans. We have no time to play around."

Shepard stared into her cup, her features tense. "If I say it, it's going to sound like something out of a hokey academy vid." She shrugged. "You know as well I as do that I was an only child: typical navy brat. My mom took me on cruises when she could; I can count on one hand the times I saw Dad in the space of ten years. I learned to appreciate what I had—to make family where I found it. My teammates—my squad—are my family." Shepard tipped her glass to her mouth.

Miranda fiddled with her empty cup, thinking of Shepard's fierce protectiveness during the mission to rescue Oriana, the hurt on her face after facing Ashley Williams on Horizon, the way Thane Krios watched her when he thought no one was looking, and the new affectionate nickname he'd given her the other day.

Abruptly Miranda activated a command on her omni-tool and the sound from the surrounding bar became muffled, as if underwater.

Shepard frowned, tapping her earpiece. "What the—?"

"I activated a privacy curtain," Miranda explained, splaying her hands across the table. "I only have a few moments before it becomes too suspicious—"

"What are you doing?" Shepard looked wary.

"I want you to know… there's a monitoring device in your bedside music player. You caught all the obvious ones, the ones we knew you'd find, even the 'sophisticated' one in the fish tank. This one is different—it doesn't even officially exist yet."

Shepard went very still. "Why are you telling me this?"

Miranda looked down at her glass and then back up. "I know about you and the drell, Commander." Shepard's eyebrows rose, a faint flush spreading across her cheeks. "And the Illusive Man may try to manipulate that. All I'm telling you is that if you need a place to go and be yourself, by yourself… or with someone else, then once you get rid of that device, you'll have it. I… may never be a good 'friend,' Shepard. I don't know what one is, frankly." She paused, looking the other woman in the eye. "But I do know what it's like to have a sister." The privacy curtain blipped out.

Shepard stared at her a moment, then nodded. "Glad you came with me, Lawson. Let's get back to the ship. I bet Mordin's figured out that new trick he wanted to try with mass effect generators in our assault rifles."

Back on the _Normandy_, Miranda opened up her unfinished report to the Illusive Man.

_Stopped at Nos Astra on Illium for information gathering and making contacts._ She paused and then typed: _mission successful._


	2. Treason

**Treason**

Miranda looked up from her desk with surprise as Shepard stomped through the door of her room on the _Normandy_, still in full armor.

"Shepard, how did the mission—"

"You lying _bitch_," Shepard snarled, cutting her off. "All that buddy-buddy, 'I know what it's like to have a sister' crap. I can't believe I fell for it."

Miranda lifted her chin, adopting the calm exterior of the Illusive Man's most trusted operative.

"Is there something wrong, Commander?"

"You bet your overly exposed ass there is!" Shepard whipped around her arm and Miranda winced reflexively, but the other woman was only bringing up her omni-tool. A holo of a quarian popped up from the display, a male.

Miranda frowned. "I don't understand—"

The look Shepard gave her would have stopped a charging krogan. "Listen to it," she hissed. The quarian started to speak in a timid, unsteady voice that sounded somewhat familiar.

"_Too many questions! Can't sleep! Can't eat! Wrong answers! Needles for wrong answers!"_

Another voice then, with the typical quarian accent. "_When they returned Veetor to us he was suffering from malnutrition, exhaustion, dehydration, and the aftereffects of several drugs."_

Shepard's voice then came over the recording, sounding shocked… and angry. _"I… I'm sorry, I was told Veetor would just be stabilized…"_

The holo blipped out.

Shepard watched her second-in-command closely, but Miranda's face had assumed that distant mask she had worn when Shepard first met her. Cold, calculating, unfeeling—the face that had said with calm honesty that she would have preferred for Shepard to have a control chip.

"You told me that Veetor would be treated well." Shepard slammed her fist down on Miranda's desk. "I was going to let Tali have him, but you and Jacob promised he wouldn't be harmed. For the sake of the mission and because you gave your _word_, I agreed. Now take a good long look at what your promises are worth." Shepard brought up the holo of poor, cowering Veetor again. Her gut clenched with fresh anger and a hot wave of guilt. She turned her omni-tool off and turned toward the door. "The worst part actually isn't even your betrayal, Miranda. It's that I was stupid enough in the first place to trust Cerberus—to trust you." Shepard stopped as the door opened.

"Stay clear of me, Lawson," she said over her shoulder.

The door closed behind her.

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A/N: I thought for sure this story was a oneshot (see previous chapter). But then I was playing my only Renegade Shep who had chosen the option to give Veetor to Cerberus for "debriefing." When I encountered him again on the Migrant Fleet, my jaw dropped. As soon as I was done, I sat down and wrote this story almost in one sitting. My reaction was basically Shepard's in this story.

There's one more story left to be told in this saga, I'm thinking. Hang tight.


	3. Allegiance

_A/N: Wow, didn't expect this one would go so long. But I'm pretty happy with it. Unbeta'd unfortunately, since my dear singeivoire has not played ME2. Feel free to point out any typos. _

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**Allegiance**

Miranda was leaving the armory when EDI's blue globe popped up beside her in the corridor.

"The Illusive Man wishes to speak with you, Officer Lawson."

Miranda pursed her lips. "Get Shepard, I'll go in and tell him she's coming."

"The Illusive Man wishes to speak to you alone."

Miranda stopped in front of the door to the Briefing Room. Nothing for it then. Straightening her spine, she entered the room.

"EDI, lock the door," Miranda said, her voice tense.

"Locking door," EDI's voice intoned.

Miranda stepped into the holographic interface, blinking as the Illusive Man's quarters came into view around her. "You wanted to see me, sir?"

The Illusive Man's glowing eyes stared at her over the end of his cigarette. He took a lingering pull and exhaled the smoke through his nose, stubbing out the cigarette in the ashtray on his chair.

"Miranda, I noticed that you have placed two of my best interrogators on leave without pay. May I ask why?"

Miranda clasped her hands behind her back. Even knowing the Illusive Man as she did, it was hard to judge his moods, but she was good at reading people and right now her instincts were telling her to tread lightly.

"Operatives Morino and Rugen disobeyed a direct order," she said plainly. "I was very explicit in my instructions in how to question the quarian Veetor'Nara, and they did not abide by my constraints." Behind her back, her nails were digging into her palms.

The Illusive Man picked up a glass at his side, swirling the contents before taking a languid sip. "I have rescinded their leave. We needed that information, Miranda, you know this. They were in the right to extract it from the quarian by any means necessary."

Miranda took an angry step forward. "There was no use torturing him! Veetor was almost simple minded to begin with!"

"From what I saw of the interrogation video, the quarian was not very cooperative and his mental instability was exacerbated by the trauma he endured on the colony. The drugs Morino and Rugen used are ones you will find in any hospital—no illegal truth serums or things of that nature."

"He's a cowering wreck," Miranda said, voice trembling with the effort of keeping herself under control. "Veetor's condition is such that my position in Shepard's trust is completely destabilized—we have not spoken other than her curt orders for me to leave the room, and I have not been off the ship even for a simple supply grab in days."

"Then you must regain her trust, I don't care how you do it." He sipped from his glass again. "The quarian—"

"His name is Veetor!" The outburst surprised even Miranda. No one interrupted the Illusive Man.

The Illusive Man's eyes narrowed slightly. "Miranda, I think I've made my position clear. By your last report, the _Normandy _is set to hit the Omega 4 relay in less than a day's time. You should rest up and prepare. Dismissed." He tapped a button on his console and the room began to fade away.

ooOOoo

Shepard stared out over the faces of her crew below her. Distantly, she could hear the scrabbling of the Collectors as they tried to figure out a way through the door that Shepard's group had locked against them. Her heart swelled as she thought about what they had been through—what was still yet to come.

Shepard took a deep breath and scanned the familiar faces. There were likely to be more Collectors guarding the immense power source at the heart of the base. She needed to choose her squad carefully.

Thane had made handy work of the drones and any possessed by Harbringer with his powerful biotic warp, but his arm had been skimmed by a particle beam in that last push. She couldn't risk taking an injured man on the last part of their mission—it _had_ to succeed. Samara? No… the asari justicar was a powerful biotic, but had shown that her weapons skills weren't up to scratch.

Shepard's eyes fell on Miranda and narrowed. She'd avoided the Cerberus operative ever since returning from the Migrant Fleet and confronting her with the truth of Veetor's condition. Miranda returned her stare: composed, collected, hardly a hair out of place. Shepard held her gaze a moment then stepped up to Jacob and Garrus, two of the calmest presences in the group.

"Jacob, Garrus, you've both proven yourselves today. I'll take a small squad ahead while you two hold out here." She clapped them on the shoulders. "I'm trusting you with them."

"You can count on us, Shepard," Garrus said, mandibles flaring.

"Jacob," Shepard said, turning to the former Alliance soldier, "if I don't come back… you know what to play for me, right?"

Jacob's jaw worked a moment. "If I have to fly to Earth to find a damned trumpet myself, I'll do it, ma'am." Jacob saluted. "_Semper fi_, Commander."

Shepard returned the salute, not trusting herself to speak, and hoisted herself up on the platform as the chittering noises of the Collectors increased in volume. She had to make this quick.

"Tali, Miranda, you're with me."

"Shepard, are you sure?" The young quarian said, coming up to stand beside her.

"Tali, there may be some weird tech back there that I won't know what to do with. I'll need an expert like you to help me figure out anything I can't follow."Shepard's mouth quirked in a grin. "Plus, that shotgun of yours is pretty handy against Collectors."

Tali nodded as Miranda came up beside her. Shepard looked down at her. She didn't trust Miranda anymore, but for the moment, their goals were aligned. As they prepared to leave, she looked once more over the group. They were all checking their weapons, sliding in new heat sinks, or patching up minor injuries with medi-gel. Thane's obsidian eyes met hers above the crowd. She held that gaze a moment, hoping that he could read what emotion she dared let up from the well of her heart. But she had lingered too long. No time now for sob speeches and tearful goodbyes. Time to go to work.

ooOOoo

There was no time for euphoria as Shepard turned away from the edge of the Collector platform where the monstrous Reaper embryo had fallen. _She did it, _Miranda thought, and wished Jacob was with them to see it. But that was for later. She followed Shepard to where Tali was already pulling up the central console. A couple of well placed explosives would cause a chain reaction, blow the base into space dust, and they could go home. _Home…_

The quarian woman was fiddling with her omni-tool at the console when, of all people, Joker's voice sounded through their earpieces. Something about the Illusive Man wanting a word. _Why am I not surprised? _Miranda adjusted her omni-tool and let the holographic Illusive Man pop into existence. Shepard scowled.

There followed the most bizarre conversation Miranda had ever witnessed. No one ever gave the Illusive Man less than what he wanted, and yet, here was this woman, this Alliance marine with scarred armor, glittering eyes, and a hard set to her jaw all proclaiming her immovability.

"Screw you!" Shepard snarled at the holo, "I'm not about to sell my soul so that Cerberus can further its goal of galactic domination."

The holographic Illusive Man turned to Miranda.

"Miranda, do not let Shepard destroy the base!"

Miranda's glass blue eyes narrowed. "Or what? You'll replace me next?"

"I gave you an order, Miranda."

"I noticed. Consider this my resignation." The words were sweet in her mouth, nearly as wonderful as the time when she'd told her father from a secure Cerberus facility that he would never control her life again.

The Illusive Man tried the commander once again. "Shepard, think about what's at stake, about everything that Cerberus has done for you! You—"

Miranda turned off her omni-tool and the holographic Illusive Man disappeared. She found that she was breathing hard and her heart was pounding. Looking up, she met Shepard's eyes. Shepard gazed at her a minute and then nodded, turning back to the Collector console.

ooOOoo

Shepard was smiling grimly as she entered the CIC. The crew members who weren't in the med-bay straightened as Jacob bellowed, "Officer on deck!"

Shepard paused, gazing at the line of people who'd waited for her, and snapped her hand in a sharp salute. Clothing and armor rustled as the crew saluted in return.

Starting at the front of the line, Shepard began to greet the crew individually. Miranda scanned the other woman's face, looking for a clue as to what the last conversation with the Illusive Man had been. If the gleam in Shepard's eye was any indication, the head of Cerberus had gotten an earful.

Thane followed silently on her heels. Miranda doubted that anyone but herself noticed the way his dark eyes lingered on her. Most of the crew shook her hand, stammering thanks, or offering shaky salutes. Zaeed nodded at the commander, and then, in a rare display of rough camaraderie, grinned and punched her shoulder. Samara actually drew the still fully armored Shepard into a hug. Garrus made an odd gesture to the Commander that took Miranda a moment to place because she'd only seen it between turians, never to an alien: the claw salute.

Miranda was next. She drew herself up.

"Commander, I…" She swallowed, hard. "Thank you. I'll do my best to renew your trust in me—"

"See that you do," Shepard said in a flat voice. "I have something of yours." The Commander pulled something small out of a compartment in her armor and pressed it into Miranda's hands.

Miranda looked down. It was a spying device—the one she'd told Shepard about weeks ago. The dark-haired woman looked up at Shepard, throat tight, and words she hadn't planned on speaking spilled from her mouth. "Commander, I never intended for Veetor to be treated as harshly as he was. I gave _strict_ orders that were not followed—"

"Miranda, we can talk about it later," Shepard interrupted, but her voice was a bit warmer than before. "I will admit, it was really something to see the look on the Illusive Man's face when you told him off today. Keep that attitude up, Lawson, and we may have a return of something approaching a working relationship again." Shepard clapped Miranda on the shoulder hard enough to bruise and moved down the line.

Miranda's omni-tool chimed: she'd received an e-mail. She moved to close it, and then saw the sender's name: Oriana.

_Miranda,_

_Your last e-mail seemed a little stressed. Don't ask how I know—must be a twin thing. Anyway, I thought maybe when whatever you're going through is done, you could send me an e-mail? I don't need any details—I don't want any details (well, okay, maybe I want some details). But just let me know you're okay. _

Miranda looked up at Shepard's face as she greeted the crew, the proud smile;, felt her face warm as one of Jacob's hands began rubbing soothing circles on her back, and reached down to type a quick reply: "_Yeah. I'm okay._"

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_A/N: Okay, now it's the end. Thanks for reading! I might post an addendum to this: bonus material, I guess. A couple of deleted scenes that didn't make sense in the context of the story that I wanted to tell. But otherwise, this story is done. May all your Sheps be BFFs with Miranda too! :D_


	4. Deleted scenes

Author's note: Here are the two deleted scenes I mentioned at the last chapter. These are very un-beta'd, so you are forewarned. Both of the scenes take place after Shepard confronts Miranda in the second chapter.

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**1 ****  
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Shepard stopped at the door to Life Support, staring at the glowing console. No, she couldn't burden him with this. Turning on her heel, Shepard felt the whoosh of the door open behind her.

"Siha?" Thane's inner eyelids blinked rapidly in surprise when he saw her standing there. "Is something…?" Shepard turned around and the misery on her face must have been evident, because he took her by the hand and drew her back into life support. She was stiff, but unresisting as he sat down on his cot and pulled her down beside him. They sat in silence for a few seconds, Thane gently stroking her cold hands between his warm, dry ones, a soothing thrum in his throat the only sound in the room.

"What's that... noise?" Shepard asked, laying a hand against his chest, feeling the vibrations and the warm beat of his heart against her skin.

"A sound my people make to soothe fretful children or distraught loved ones," Thane said, smiling.

Shepard let her hand drop.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No... not right now."

Wordlessly, he pulled her to him and she leaned against him, feeling his warmth seep into the coldness that seemed to inhabit her bones and hearing the murmuring hum in his chest soothe, at least for a moment, the troubled wrinkle on her brow.

**2  
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"I take it Shepard chewed you out too?"

Miranda's hands on her pistol didn't waver, aiming at the holographic targets. There were only blanks in the pistol, of course; decompression on a space ship was no laughing matter, but the gun still gave a satisfying kick in her palm.

"What makes you say that?" she asked calmly, squeezing the trigger three times. The holographic targets lit up across the board green: perfect.

Jacob came up and leaned against the wall. "Cause I just got an earful from Miss Lazarus about that quarian from Freedom's Progress. Plus, you never target practice unless something's bugging you."

Miranda lowered her pistol, considering ordering up another half-dozen targets, but she'd already beaten her own record today.

"Miranda," Jacob's gaze was serious. "I told her I wasn't involved with the quarian's questioning—that you'd taken care of the details when we left the colony. She got real quiet—the dangerous kind. What happened?"

She almost told him to leave her alone, let her tongue say petty, cruel things that she didn't really mean. It would have been easier, certainly, and he was no stranger to angry words from her. But for once the memories of all the times they'd hurt each other seemed far away, and she remembered the good times: Jacob coaxing a smile from her after a difficult day with a joke and a flower; Jacob getting up early to make breakfast; Jacob's mouth warm on hers and his hands strong and sure on her body.

Miranda bit her lip. "I… made a misjudgment with the 'questioning' of Veetor." She looked away, not wanting to see the condemnation there. "Against my orders, he was tortured."

Silence. Miranda dared to look up at him, but his face was unreadable.

"And Shepard found out?"

She nodded.

"Did you tell her that it was against your orders?"

Miranda huffed a brittle laugh. "Think about it, Jacob, who is she likely to believe? The Cerberus agent who represents everything she hates about humanity, or the evidence staring her through the mask of an environmental suit?" With vicious motions, she loaded a new clip of blanks into her pistol and punched in the order for a new target on the console in front of her.

She raised the gun to aim, but something was off: the targets seemed to swim in front of her eyes and her arms weren't steady. Jacob laid a warm hand on her arm.

"Let it go, Miranda."

She wanted to cry; she wanted to turn to Jacob, bury her head on his shoulders; let someone else carry the load. But there was too much unsaid between them—an outpouring of emotion right now would only be awkward and increase the gulf between them.

After a moment, she controlled herself and said in a reasonably calm voice: "Jacob, I'm… you know that I'm loyal to Cerberus, right?"

"Never questioned it a moment in my life."

Miranda looked up at him. "What if… what if there was something—or someone—else that had my loyalty? Someone whose morals aren't always suspect, whom I don't have to make excuses for?"

Jacob searched her face for a moment.

"I'd say that sounds like a friend worth fighting for."

* * *

_And that's it. Thanks again for reading!_


End file.
